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Just outside the comfortable reaches of the grand bay that makes up the waters next to Horseshoe Harbor are several archipelago. Various groups of uncharted islands, many of which are surrounded in complete and total mystery…

Among the closer of these island groups are the Nightmare's Necklace. So named because of the circular formation, and because the skies around tend to be constantly overcast with dark, ominous stormclouds.

Nobody knows, of course, that the source of these stormclouds is due to a small cult that has formed on the biggest of these islands. It started as a group of pegasus, but recent shipwrecks have inflated their numbers… Now they're a group of roughly thirty assorted individuals. Pegasus, griffons, earth ponies, unicorns… Even a couple merponies! And tonight, they're doing a /special/ chant.

They've gathered in a big circle within their biggest cavern, a great altar set up in the middle, where two pegasus have set up the proper materials for a ritual. Lots of body parts. Very greusome.

"Behold my brothers! The time has come to welcome the Great Faceless One into this world!" one of the twin cultist leaders cries out, hooves raised. "Chant, brothers! Chant! The sacred words must ring loud! Must ring clear!"

The other leader mirrors the first's motions. "Chant with us, brothers! Tonight we show the world what true power is!"

The assorted cultists all raise their hooves, and begin to chant.

"Klatu… Verata… Nictu… Klatu… Verata… Nictu…"

With the chanting going, both cultsts look to their altar. The point. They dance. They wiggle mystical mojo objects. They even cut themselves to bleed onto the altar! How disgusting. But the ritual seems to be doing its trick. The magical forces are weaving around the ritual altar, the random pieces of bodyparts are moving. Being drawn together. The greusome head, which had no eyes to this point, suddenly grows a fresh pair that light with etheral glow.

The body parts join together into one great monstrocity of flesh. The whole thing rising over the altar, a great whinny echoing throughout the cavern!

"Brothers! One more chant!"

Practically frenzied, the assorted cultists get up on their hooves, lifting what they can to the sky! "KLATU!"

The cult leaders practically fall on each other. "VERATA!"

…And then, out of nowhere, the smallest hint of…pepper? Sneeze powder? It's hard to say. The last ship that wrecked was from a joke factory. But the effects are instant, and clear.

"NIC*ACHOO*"

All the cultists sneeze at once! The monstrocity of flesh suddenly erupts into fire! Horrible screams and whinnies bounce off all the rock walls, the mess crashing down onto the altar with a sickening fleshy sound.

There is…a great silence. No more chanting. No more sounds. Just every creature, staring at the altar.

"Did… Did it work? Is he here?" one cultist in the front row asks, a wide-eyed peach-colored filly.

"Sssss…"

A soft hiss escapes from the altar, prompting a number of ponies to turn their attention that way. The fleshy parts, once a rainbow of pastels, have turned a uniform sickly green. Its hair, sprawled across the alter, is oily and midnight blue; if one squints, one can almost imagine the strands reaching, clawing for a victim. Its hooves are rubbed and cracked, like a thin veneer of paint that's outlived its usefulness over centuries. "Sss…sa. Ha. Haa…"

Under the mop of hair is a flash of white teeth. A rictus grin. "Ha, ha… ha ha! Ha!" As though trying to seek out new footing, the creature's hind leg kicks out at the altar. In the light, the cultists can see the sign of death upon its flank. "Ha ha ha ha hahahaha! HA HA HA!" Like a marionette, its hooves seek, splay. Stagger. It pushes up to crouching, its hair still hanging like oily kelp about its face, exposing just the twisted, laughing mouth.

"DEAR LUNA IT'S HIDEOUS!" one cultist cries out, promptly fainting! Several more bow down in immediate reverie! "It has succeeded! Our god has come! We are saved! The world is DOOMED!"

The cult leaders, though recoiling at the horror they have awoken, both point at the twisted monstrocity. "You are not the Faceless One!" one brother shrieks! His twin practically white as a sheet. "You… You… Oh Celestia, what have we called? What foul demonspawn have we conjured forth unto this world!?"

"HA HA HA HA!" A trembling hoof steps forward, bits of flesh crackling off like crumbs. It touches down, and the creature slumps its weight onto it before dragging another hoof ahead of that one. The slump-shuffle takes it closer to the cult leaders, a few strands of hair parting to reveal fiery blue eyes staring at them, into their souls, retracted into a frightening stare.

"You've called the scourge upon you," it hisses, raspy, throaty voice still laughing in every word. "I should be thanking you, my little ponies. I haven't felt this good in a /long/ time…" The shambling horror reaches the edge of the circle and hesitates, shaking, staring at its summoners with a smile that practices /chaos/. "Come give us a kiss…"

"AHHHHH!" both the cult leaders scream, taking off in different directions! "It is not our god! It has come to EAT US ALL! Run for your lives!"

The assorted cultists scatter like the wind! …Or they would if there was more than one way out. The scattering converges on this singular exit point, which at once seems suddenly too small to get out through.

The creature crouches, and leaps, out of the circle, off the altar, onto the nearest table. Spellbooks scatter everywhere under its hooves, sending important arcane texts thumping to the ground. Manic laughter accompanies a toss of its head as thunder crashes on cue outside. As its hair flies back, a horn reveals itself.

The outgrowth of bone starts to spark, sputter, and suddenly lights up with a green magic that matches its coat. Those same spell books fly into the air, and begin to zoom, pages fluttering. "HA HA HA HA HA!! YOU FOOLS!" it cackles, as those newly minted instruments of death fly at the cultists, slamming into heads and crashing into walls. "YOU FOOLS!"

Chaos! Panic! What ponies weren't pushing hard to escape are now falling over from the bludgeoning of books and other arcane objects! Look, there's a pony with a MILLION PAPER CUTS! And another one slipping on a page and landing in a fire! And ANOTHER one that somehow fell onto one of the ritual candelabras! Oh the GORE! The cult leaders are nowhere to be found anymore.

Just the lowly shipwrecked ponies-turned-cultists, falling like flies and running out of the cave to try their luck at swimming to the main land to escape the sheer horror they've unleashed!

And behind them, the laughter rings like a horrible, dissonent bell, carrying across the waves. The creature stands at the mouth of the cave, objects flying in a tornado of chaos with it at the center.